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BOOK REVIEW: Four Views on Hell 2nd edition

This is a guest post by David Jakubovic. The views are that of the author and don't necessarily reflect the views of That Ancient Faith. A 20 year update of the 1996 book by the same name, this slim volume (211 pages) is a helpful cross-section of current evangelical thought on Final Punishment, sampling Denny Burk on Eternal Conscious Torment (ECT hereafter), John Stackhouse Jr on Conditional immortality (CI hereafter), Robin Parry on Christian Universalism (CU hereafter) and Jerry Walls on (a Protestant) Purgatory. Preston Sprinkle pens both Introduction and Conclusion, plus there are Scripture, Author and Subject indices. The Introduction sets the scene,...

The Relationship Between Jesus and Sophia

Now you may be wondering about the title, or thinking “who the heck is Sophia??” — well, bear with me, and all will be revealed. It’s not as sinister or weird as it may first appear. I saw a post on my Instagram feed the other day that just got me a little riled up. I’ll admit it, I can be a little short-tempered at times, especially around the subject of Jesus and seeing him/the Christian faith misrepresented to such a degree that it could mislead others down the wrong path. I don’t normally write responses to things like this, but I felt this one deserved it, mainly just to add some clarity to a somewhat confusing topic, and so there’s a pla...

The Historic Practice of Abortion and How Ancient Christians Responded

It’s no secret that the majority of Christians are against abortion, no matter where you look in the world. But nowhere has the issue come to more of a head than in the US recently with the overturning of Roe v Wade, which had made abortion legal across the country. Now abortion is no longer a federal constitutional right, but individual states now have the authority to determine the legality and rulings around abortion. Christian opposition to abortion in America has always been a heated topic, especially in recent decades, but this isn’t a novelty within the Church in America, or globally, and has been a position of the faithful for about 2000 years. Even...

The Coming of Jesus: The Olivet Discourse – Part 2

...s in that Creation is to be renewed and reconciled, rather than scrapped and rebuilt. The prophet Joel also spoke of this “Day” and that this meant it was the “last days” - a fact which Peter confirms in his famous sermon on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2). Joel 2:31 says that “[t]he sun shall be turned to darkness, and the moon to blood, before the great and terrible day of the Lord comes.” Peter ties this prophecy to the Pentecost event when the Holy Spirit was poured out on them, by telling the people watching that “this is what was spoken through the prophet Joel” (Acts 2:16) and then goes on to quote the rest of Joel’s prophecy, beginning...

Women should be silent?

...1 Timothy 2:12 - "I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she is to keep silent." Here's an often tricky subject, depending on who you speak to about it. Before I begin, it should be noted here that these words ("woman" and "man") could also be translated as "wife" and "husband", which then changes the thrust of this command quite drastically. This verse, and others similar, are often taken by people to mean that it only applies in a church setting (ignoring the fact that we are the Church - 1 Cor 12:27; Rom 12:5). A little while ago when discussing this topic, an argument was put forth about the 'Woman at the Well' preaching to other...

The Coming of Jesus: Revelation Fulfilled?

...from that Creation should only last that long, but there you go. If this is accurate, though, and runs according to the Jewish calendar  (which counts from day one of Creation), then we only have around another 224 years to go before we find out for sure, as we are now in the 5776th year – so that’ll be the year 2239 the world potentially ends, for anyone keeping track! For a more detailed look at the resurrection and the New Jerusalem, I will do some short follow up articles on those, rather than make this one any longer (Edit: New Jerusalem article is here).   To Conclude Whichever way you slice it, Revelation seems to be predominantly about the per...